…and the final tweek, hmm, yes! My Facebook profile is now a perfect refection of, no not me (don’t be foolish!) it’s that ‘ideal’ person. Sound familiar? Facebook – 500 million profiles of people who don’t exist! Is your Facebook page a reflection on you or your alter ego?

So why are people shy to be themselves? It makes far more interesting conversation when people talk about what they want to, rather than what they think they should. This was demonstrated at a conference I attended. Five people were taken to the front then we spoke to the person next us about anything we wanted. The majority of us were reserved and had the standard conversations, where our partners live, what they do etc. etc. We were then asked to write what we talked about on a speech bubble and to hold it up. The five people at the front were given the task to select which conversation they would like to join. Which did they pick? Yes, you guessed it – the ones which were the most odd, strange and outright bizarre. The point was – these conversations were not odd, strange or bizarre, rather people just being themselves. Generally people put up barriers in normal conversation just like they do on their profile Facebook, it is nothing new.

With the developments in social networking and blogging it is easier than ever to share your thoughts, research complementary and opposing viewpoints and have discussions around the world with people about them. What an opportunity! A chance to develop and become happier with your thoughts. It just takes the courage to share a piece of your heart. With the way technology is in our society, people have two options to hide or to strive.

This can be a challenge depending on how well you know yourself and how happy you are with yourself. Do you really know yourself? Why not try new things to learn more about yourself? If don’t like it then you then know you don’t like that activity, whereas if you do like it – then bonus! 🙂 Additionally, trying new things helps in many different ways. I once heard someone describe life as setting out many dots. Dots which maybe be connected later in life in completely surprising situations. Their point was the more dots you have the more chance that something will assist you later in life. Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Computer says that if he never attended the calligraphy course while at college then the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. This was a dot that was connected much later in his life. Sometimes parts of life can feel irrelevant until, sometimes many years, later a connection can be made and an opportunity to understand yourself better.

A piece of advice I was once told. If you ever feel down, simply write down the five things you’re most proud of. Ok, maybe it sounds stupid, but it’s easy to remember the bad times/the failures and forget the good times/achievements. Go on give it a go – what have you got to lose? I hope it helps you to be more yourself.